Four charged with kidnapping man for $50,000 ransom

Four people have now been charged with beating and holding a man for a $50,000 ransom after accusing him of stealing narcotics and money, court records show.

Three of the suspects were arrested on March 28, two days after the victim was allegedly kidnapped. The fourth suspect Jose Jimenez, 23, has not been arrested but prosecutors have now connected him to the crime after he confessed in May, according to a charging document from the Harris County District Court.

Rudis Umanzor, 21, John Romero Cortez, 26, and Fernando Carreno are also charged with aggravated kidnapping for the incident that began on March 26 at 5909 Fondren, the document states.

The victim was taken outside his apartment complex at gun point by two of the men. He was forced onto the floor of a white van and taken to a house on the 18400 bloc of Flint Hill Drive. A witness, who was at the house, told investigators that her boyfriend Umanzor told her they had kidnapped a man because he had stolen narcotics and money from someone else. The witness identified Cortez and Carreno as the two who brought the victim to the house.

Once the man was taken to a back room of the house, the witness told investigators that she could hear them beating him. The victim told investigators that his clothes were stripped off, his hands and feet were bound and his head and eyes were wrapped using duct tape. He was struck, beat and interrogated about the missing narcotics, he told investigators.

The brother of the victim began receiving phone calls from the victim’s cell phone number, and the kidnappers demanded money in exchange for him. Police opened an investigation into the kidnapping on March 27.

A Houston Police Department officer in the neighborhood of the residence saw the victim with his hands bound and duct tape over his eyes falling over the back of the fence and saw Umanzor jumping over the fence after him. The officer watched as he led the man forward with a knife at his back. An officer arrested Umanzor and later identified the two other suspects.

On May 14, during the investigation of another case, Jimenez confessed to being present during the kidnapping on March 26. He admitted that he was driving the white van when the victim was abducted.

Court records show that Umanzor and Carreno are out on bond and Carreno is in custody. Jimenez has not been arrested.